October 30, 2009

Twists and turns...

I will make a very long story short. In one of my previous posts I described how I felt as though a tornado was nipping at my heels, well, I feel like it is moving on. Finally!! Stick with me till the end because it gets interesting ;-)

We moved to the Charlotte area 3 years ago and decided to rent until we knew that where we were starting out, was where we wanted to put down our roots. We moved into a lovely rental and fell in love with the house and area. We asked our landlord if he would sell the house to us, he agreed and so we began to think of the house as "ours". We did a few improvements and generally felt like this was "home".

6 weeks ago a man came to our door to serve our landlord with papers. We told him we were just the renters and he proceeded to tell us that our house was in foreclosure and that the landlord hadn't paid his mortgage for 11 months!!! We paid him on time, each and every month, only to have him put our money in his greedy little pocket. This sent us in to panic mode and then immediately into action mode. We found a beautiful house that was in our same neighborhood and decided that needed to be home.

Well~ it was a short sale, so we needed approval from the bank which we were told could take up to 6 months. It didn't. They got back to us quickly and last week we closed on our new home!!

I'm in complete love. We were very blessed each step of the way and it has felt like this was all part of our "plan". Like it was meant to be. I won't go into the specifics because we would be here all day long but suffice it to say, the list is long and we were blessed.

Right before we closed we made a very interesting discovery. Hold on to your hats....


I have a graveyard in the woods behind my house!!!! No kidding!!!


I was a little taken back at first but now I find it amazing and strangely comforting. There is a huge old tree that looks over all the graves. The graveyard is abandoned and grown over. Time has forgotten it and the people who were buried there so long ago.

Many of the graves are just these rocks, stuck into the ground, with no markings or any way to identify the person who was laid to rest there. It pangs my heart. Who was this?

Others have names and were buried in the 1920's and 1930's.


This headstone is the first one you see as you walk into the woods.

There are about 40 of these unmarked rock headstones. The neighbors have been told that they could be slave graves or a poor mans burial ground. *sniff sniff*

Some of the graves are knocked down and sunken in.
Ahhhhh...this is a bit creepy.

I plan to take care of this sweet discovery with my kids and not let it be lost in time and grown over. Hopefully there is no lingering ghosties that want to say hello :-)


Have a very
HAPPY HALLOWEEN!

xoxo Emily xoxo


16 comments:

Kristina P. said...

OK, now we need pictures of the actual house!

Anjeny said...

That is kinda creepy cool. Cool you found the perfect house, creepy that you have an old abandoned graves kinda right in your backyard.

Believe it or not, we actually moved next to a graveyard...the community's graveyard. We are actually enjoying the peace that the dead give us but our nuances comes from the losers who seem to think that a cemetary is a place to hang out and drink themselves silly.

Can't wait to see your magical touch that you will be bestowing upon that graveyard. Good luck and have fun!!

laterg8r said...

wow, what a rollercoaster - hopefully your house feels like a home very quickly :D

Jami said...

I've known a lot of people who have had that happen with their rentals. It's just nasty mean. Some landlords act like there aren't real people living in the homes they "own."

I'm so glad God has helped you into a new home.

You should list the info on the marked stones on the blog. Who knows someone may desperately seeking the information contained in your backyard.

mary.liz said...

I wonder if you can find records of the church that used to be on the grounds to see if someone from the church kept records from the cemetary. Certainly somewhere it is written down?! You would think!! Maybe check with the city? Of course when everything settles down!

alisha said...

congratulations!!! and how cool....i'm sure finding out the history of it will be awesome :-)

Ben said...

So awesome Em!

* said...

No kidding, a graveyard in your backyard?! All the more curious because it is so old and overgrown. What a treasure.

I'm so happy for you to have found the perfect home in your neighborhood. Boo to the landlord who didn't pay the mortgage on your other house, though. What a stinker guy!

The (Un)Experienced Mom said...

I saw your post on TTB about this. Wow. I would be freaked, but I am glad you've made peace with it...(not that you'll be going outside around there by yourself at night or anything!).

Happy Halloween!

Lisa B. said...

Wow, that sounded really rough. I'm so glad there was a beautiful house waiting for you in the end! Show us pics. of the house soon, and keep us updated on your grave project!! It's so sweet of you to care about the forgotten graves!!

Hugs,
Lisa

Darci said...

Okay, that would creep me out! On the other hand, I'm glad that this move is working out to be a blessing.

The Crash Test Dummy said...

Oh my goodness! That is awesome! Congratulations. I don't envy your physical move, but that is really exciting news.

New England Alyson needs to hear about this spooktacular graveyard. How very appropriately intriguing.

Can you believe it's been a hear since our spooky story contest????

And I am so excited Ben is getting married. That's exciting.

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OldBoatGuy said...

I'm sure you got a laugh out of the annon post!!!

One of my great grand fathers is burried in a lost cemetaty. My older brother saw it 30 years ago, but 5 years ago he couldn't find it.

I hope you have a good holliday season, Arlon

Joanne said...

I just shared your post with Dave and he reminded me that some of the stone you see in the graveyard may be footstones. They were popular in the South. We actually have the footstone of one of Dave's great grandfather's, William Perry. He found it in the bushes and decided he could take better care of it. The footstone sits on his credenza in his office. I'm glad you found your dream house. Good luck getting settled in.

Heather said...

oh wow...you LUCKY duck! what a find! and how lucky they are to have you to care for them. I think you could make it a very sweet and restful place. what history!!!! And what a project to find out who they are...